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Communauto A car rental P2P website based in Montreal, Quebec City, Sherbrooke, and Gatineau.http://www.communauto.com/PEP/index_ENG.html What is this thing? Communauto is an online car sharing project that survives through peer-to-peer engagement. Communauto's goal is to offer a cheaper and more flexible way of renting cars while reducing the number of cars on the road. Communauto has over 23 000 subscribers who share over 1100 vehicles (half the cars for the number of people) within Montreal, Quebec City, Sherbrooke and Gatineau. People can sign up to be a driver (a car renter) or a car owner (a car loaner). The cost of the registration of car drivers is dependent on the package chosen. Communauto offers four types of packages drivers can choose from to suit their needs. There are no fees to display the availabilities of your car to other drivers. Car owners make their car available by connecting to Réservauto with their P2P account number and password and select the desired time slots to rent the car. The only criteria to list a car for rent is that any vehicle older than 48 months will have to be inspected by a Communauto mechanic shop, at your own cost. Why is this project really worth your time? Communauto says: Its economic: The driver gets to provide a useful service to others while at the same time getting help to pay for your car. Its green: Less vehicles to serve more people it's ecological. Its safe: Communauto has insurance coverage! This means your insurance record will never be touched if any damage is done to your car. Its trustworthy: Only drivers with a good driving record will have access to your vehicle. Communauto vs Car rental companies Communauto on the surface may seem like a strange new idea; renting your car out to complete strangers is a concept we have not yet been exposed to yet. This may make people reluctant to try it. You should not be so quick to shy away from Communauto because it is an all-around beneficial online peer-to-peer platform. Communauto has taken the successful idea of car sharing and reorganized it in a new collarborative way where corporations are not the only one's benefiting. Essentally, Communauto is an attractive platform beacuse it is decentralized and advocates for the benefit of car owners, car drivers and environment. Through the traditional car rental companies, offered a non-collaborative, centralized serive. It was the car rental companies that own the product and decide how it is used and distributed. (<- don't really get this sentence...) Communauto offers a new collaborative service where car owners, drivers and Communauto work together to provide a mutually benefital platform for renting. Car owners have the opportunities, through Communauto, to profit from their ownership. Traditionally, the only way a car owner could profit from their car is by selling it but through Communauto car owners can make $20.00 a day just for renting their car. Communauto is a platform for car owners to gain profit from their cars rather than having them sit in the drive-way and collect dust. Drivers are the ones that are really benefiting from this project. When renting a car from a car rental company in Montreal, one has to be at least 25 years old, which excludes all other certified drivers under 25. With Communauto, any certified driver may rent a car - making for better equality and accessibility. Drivers also save a lot of money by renting through Communauto. It costs $1.67 an hour or $20.04 and 10¢ per kilometer a day no matter the model of the car and no matter the day during the week. When renting from a midsize sedan from a car rental company, it costs $31.49 a day for weekends and $49.49 a day during the week. To rent a minivan to accommodate to more travelers it cost $80.49 on both weekends and week days. "Dude, where's my car?" With Communauto there are many other benefits that make Communauto a trustworthy project. Car owners do not need to worry about their car because they can make their vehicle accessible to all our members, or select a restricted group of members. At any time a car owner can block the access of your car to a member by placing him on the black list, all while keeping your decision to do so confidential. Car owners do not have to worry about the safety of their car because the driver who borrows your car are evaluated rigorously before being excepted into the project. When drivers subscribe, Communauto verifies the driver's SAAQ record, their history of claim statements and their credit record. In addition, once admitted to the service, they must respect the rules and regulations for the use of vehicles. This helps eliminate those "dude, where's my car" moments. The car owners’ vehicle is covered by a compressive insurance policy with La Capitale General Insurance. This means that the car owners car will benefit from the highest protection coverage, no matter what happens. Your insurance record will never be affected by any incident that may occur during a reservation. This insurance covers, among other things, fire, material damages, theft and civil responsibility. Limitations of Communauto Although Communauto is a great and innovative peer-to-peer project, there are a few limitations that should be addressed by Communauto. 1. When renting a car, the car owner and car driver have to meet at an arranged point to exchange the keys. This makes the project a bit of a hassle for the participants and raises questions on how safe the project truly is. A possible solution to this could be the introduction of the option for the car owner to leave the keys with a Communauto office, and have the drivers pick it up then. This way, if a car owner wants to rent their car for a long period of time they do not have to continuously arrange to meet with the drivers. 2. The drivers are not allowed to leave the Province of Quebec: this is because the insurance only covers the Province of Quebec. This limitation could be enough to make renters go with traditional rental companies versus going with Communauto. Conclusion Communauto has successful revamped the traditional way of car renting. It has created a more flexible has well as cheaper alternative for its subscribers. By redistributing the power of the car rental companies, into the hands of the actual car owners and car drivers, Communauto has created an online peer-to-peer platform that is mutually beneficial for the drivers, car owners and even the envrionment. This is a platform that is safe, trustworthy, economic and green. What more can you really ask for? Word Cited http://www.communauto.com/pep/index_ENG.html http://www.communauto.com/auto-mobile/index_en.html http://www.communauto.com/forfaitsABC_ENG.html# Category:Conclusion